Susan acted as sole counsel for the government defending two separate challenges brought by Unison, to the legality of the employment tribunal and EAT fees regime introduced in July 2013: Unison v Lord Chancellor (no 1) and (no 2). In May 2014, she acted for the Judicial Appointments Commission in its successful defence of the first judicial review challenge to be heard by a Court: Jones v Judicial Appointments Commission which concerned the operation of the Good Character Guidance in relation to points accrued on an applicant’s driving licence. Susan has 20 years’ experience in all areas of employment law with particular expertise in discrimination claims. In 2013 she successfully represented an Employment Judge in his defence of a claim that he has aided sex, race and disability discrimination against the claimant by her employer: Sivanandan v Cole. Complex issues that have arisen in recent cases include the territorial applicability of certain statutory claims such as unfair dismissal, the effect of ECJ case-law on the operation and calculation of holiday under the Working Time Regulations and whether a claimant is an employee, worker or contractor. She regularly acts pro bono for appellants in the Employment Appeal Tribunal under the ELAAS scheme.

Related selected cases

• O'Connor v Jaguar Land Rover: 27 January 2020 Susan acted for successful Claimant who was found to have been automatically unfairly dismissed for walking off-site from the Midlands Jaguar Land Rover factory. This was due to his belief that his health was in serious danger from unextracted car exhaust fumes on the factory line: Read the Employment Tribunal decision here
• Fahim Afzal v Domino’s Pizza [2018] ICR 1652 – Susan acted for an assistant manager with the Respondent, in successfully appealing to the EAT against the employment tribunal’s finding that the employer’s failure to give him an appeal did not make his dismissal unfair. He was a spouse of an EEA national who had been dismissed for failing that he had made an in-time Home Office application to extend his leave, on the day that his leave expired, even though he at all times held leave and could have proved this if given an appeal.
• Witts v Wyre Forest School– Susan acted for the appellant teaching assistant in his EAT appeal, which was successful because the tribunal hearing his unfair dismissal claim had failed to take account that appellant was acting in self-defence. The appellant had been dismissed for gross misconduct from school for an incident in which a special needs pupil fell to the ground after attacking the appellant.
• Unison v Lord Chancellor and Equality and Human Rights Commission [2014] IRLR 226
  (legality of Fees Scheme introduced in Employment Tribunals and Employment Appeal Tribunal in July 2013)
• Jones v Judicial Appointments Commission [2014] EWHC 1680 (whether JAC’s refusal to appoint an applicant to become a District Judge on character grounds, because he had 7 current points on his driving licence, was lawful)
• Dragonfly Consultancy Ltd v Revenue and Customs Commissioners (2008) STC 3030 (liability of IT consultant for tax and NI under intermediaries legislation)

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